“We worked really hard to try to find other solutions,” he said. “At the end of it, we had to make a really unpleasant business decision.”

Three assistant principals, a counselor and the school's operations manager lost their jobs last week.

The school's principal also was reassigned, but Larson said that move was unrelated to the layoffs or the district's financial situation.

Charter schools can dismiss employees much more easily than traditional public schools because they're not beholden to the same state contract rules, but Larson said the process still is painful.

Some of those let go were hired less than six months ago. Larson said the charter school district made some hiring decisions based on inaccurate budget projections.

He called the financial pressure a “state budget cut issue,” but acknowledged the growing district failed to promptly notify the Texas Education Agency of its increased enrollment.

“That's part of the problem,” Larson said. “We had a transition in our financial department at that time and that helped to create the problem. That was one of a number of factors.”

State funding is distributed to school districts on a per-pupil basis. Average daily attendance at local KIPP schools jumped from 842 students last school year to 1,172 students this academic year, entitling the district to more state dollars, Texas Education Agency spokeswoman DeEtta Culbertson said.

It's up to local districts to let the state know of anticipated or actual enrollment changes. Because KIPP only recently filed a report with the TEA, the district has been receiving payments based on last school year's numbers.

TEA has agreed to pay the district a lump sum of $353,749 to make up for the discrepancy in recent months. That payment “should be in their bank account within the next few days,” Culbertson said.

Larson said the district worked hard to avoid any cuts to the classroom, instead cutting administrators at the district's only high school, which had a principal, four assistant principals, an instructional coach, multiple counselors and an operations manager for about 350 students.

There have been no budget-related layoffs at other KIPP-SA schools and none are planned, Larson said.

“I don't understand where you can be that big in the hole that you have to let people go in November,” she said. “That's poor planning.”

Rendon-Lopez said personnel changes at the school are “very frequent,” noting that the school now is on its third principal since opening in 2009.

“If they don't have the right people in the job, who hired them?” she asked.

Joyce Boubel had been principal at University Prep for about 18 months when she was reassigned last week. She now will be a math coach at both KIPP middle schools.

Boubel became the high school principal on the condition she eventually would be allowed to return to the classroom and “it was time for us to keep our promise,” Larson said, adding, “I've never seen a better math teacher.”

Jennifer Zinn the district's director for teacher quality, replaced Boubel. Some of those laid off may continue to work for the district in another capacity, Larson said.